Matthew Lillard has spent nearly thirty years being asked the same question, and he's clearly stopped pretending it doesn't amuse him.
The actor, who played Stu Macher in the original 1996 *Scream*, sat down for a new interview this week and got real about the fan campaign that insists his character somehow survived getting a television dropped on his head.
For the uninitiated: Stu was one of the two killers in Wes Craven's slasher classic, and he met his end in the film's bloody finale.
But a stubborn corner of the internet has spent years building elaborate theories that Stu is still out there, possibly pulling strings in later installments.
His response this time landed somewhere between delighted and exhausted.
He told the interviewer that he loves the passion, but gently pointed out that a TV to the skull is a fairly definitive exit.
Still, he admitted the theory has kept his phone buzzing for decades, which isn't a bad problem for a working actor to have.
What makes the whole thing stickier is the timing.
With the franchise churning out new entries and the recent passing of the series' original director still fresh in fans' minds, nostalgia for the 1996 cast is at an all-time high.
Every time a new *Scream* movie gets announced, the Stu truthers come crawling back out of the woodwork.
Lillard, for his part, has never fully shut the door.
In past interviews he's joked that he'd come back "in a heartbeat" if someone wrote it, which fans have treated as gospel rather than a casual soundbite.
That ambiguity is exactly why the rumor refuses to die.
Here's the thing about the Stu theory: it persists because the original film is genuinely that beloved, and because Lillard's performance is a big reason why.
His manic, unhinged energy made Stu one of the most quotable villains in horror history.
People don't theorize about characters they've forgotten.
Lillard has built a fascinating career since then, bouncing between horror, family films, and a long stint voicing Shaggy in the Scooby-Doo cartoons.
But ask most fans on the street what they know him for, and it's Stu.
That's the double-edged sword of a role that defines you before you're thirty.
Probably exactly where we've been for years: Lillard being a good sport, fans refusing to let go, and a studio that knows a built-in audience when it sees one.
The door stays cracked, and everyone gets to keep the dream alive a little longer.
The smart money says he'd say yes if the script was right.
The even smarter money says the *Scream* brain trust has already thought about it more than once.
Sometimes the loudest fan theory becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, and this one has had three decades to marinate.
Our take: Lillard is handling this the only way a veteran genre actor can, with a wink and a shrug.
He knows the Stu theory is nonsense, and he also knows it's the most loyal fan base he'll ever have.
Final Thoughts
If the call ever comes, don't be shocked if he answers it with a grin.